Arabie Saoudite : l'arme nucléaire

[Kiwi de fer]

AQBA !? AQ DOM TOM sa me rappele un truc dans un one man show :P

[Fenrir]

Je confonds avec un autre sigle de "filiale"

[Tomcat]

Je confonds avec un autre sigle de "filiale"

 

AQPA ? Al-Qaida dans la péninsule Arabique peut être 

 

 

C'est clairement la menace que fait agiter Ryad mais quand on regard de plus près la situation du pays, ils ont les mains moins libre que il y a un an ou deux.

En premier lieu, la politique de "Saouditisation" du royaume visant l'expulsions de millions de travailleurs illégaux qui occupaient les professions les plus dégradantes et les moins rémunérées va avoir des effets inverses de ceux désirés et s'avérer extrêmement couteuse au niveau de l'économie. Le calcule était pourtant d'une simplicité "Lepenienne", les travailleurs immigrés sont à l'origine de tous les délits( vol, drogue, prostitution) et de la crise de moralité du pays et en plus ils volent le travail d'honnête et jeunes Saoudiens au chômage (pas sûr que le Saoudien moyen veuille travailler 14h par jour pour une bouchée de pain, séquestré et torturé comme quasi tous les domestiques du pays).

Deuxièmement, les largesses de la nouvelle politique sociale, dite anti-printemps arabe, du pays qui a pour objectif d'étouffer toute contestation légitime sous des torrents de pétro $ (on parle de hautes études à l'étranger gratuites, maisons gratuites, voitures gratuites, paiement de dote etc.) coûte aussi très chère. 

Troisièmement, l'Egypte devient de plus en plus un gouffre financier, un malade transfusé avec la juguler ouverte, sans parler de la Syrie, Jordanie, Maroc et autres pays dépendants de l'aide économique de Ryad mais qui en terme retour sur investissement ne représentent pas grande chose. 

Quatrièmement, la production de pétrole Saoudien, si elle a augmenté avec l'embargo iranien, ne permet pas de compenser l'augmentation croissante de la consommation interne. Un article du Time rapportait que pour maintenir un niveau d'exportation consent, l'AS devait investir plus de 10 M$ annuellement pour les 15 prochaines années. 

 

 

Bon, après c'est sûr que "l'activité terroriste" est une activité qui nécessite peu de moyen. 3 ou 4 donateurs fortunés pourraient faire tourner une filiale d'Al-Qaida pendant des années surtout que cette activité est même parfois auto-financée par la pliages, vols, extorsions, trafic etc.  Mais c'est un pari risqué puisqu'avec un Iran de retour sur la scène internationale et pétrolière + les E-U moins dépendant du pétrole Saoudien, pourrait faire abattre une pluie de sanctions (bien méritée) sur la famille royale pour financement du terrorisme. 

[Tomcat]

Pas de nouvel an (infidèle) pour le "partenaire de référence" de la France au M-O. La police morale va appliquer un Fatwa interdisant la célébration du nouvel an du calendrier Géorgien en ciblant prioritairement les vendeurs de fleurs et de peluches.

 

http://www.lemonde.fr/moyen-orient/article/2013/12/29/nouvel-an-interdit-en-arabie-saoudite_4341120_1667081.html

 

Bon, après tout ils font ce qu'ils veulent chez eux.... tant qu'ils achètent des armes on peut même présenter ce pays comme "ayant la volonté d'oeuvrer pour la paix (sic), la sécurité (sic) et stabilité (double sic) au Moyen-Orient" dixit FH lors de sa visite dans le pays. 

 

http://www.lemonde.fr/moyen-orient/article/2013/12/29/hollande-en-visite-en-arabie-saoudite-ce-dimanche_4341087_1667081.html

[collectionneur]

Ce n'est pas aux EAU (Abu Dhabi ?) a côté que l'on prépare le plus gros feu d'artifice au Monde pour le 1er janvier ? Entendu cela vite fait a la radio.

[Ciders]

Si. 400 000 fusées prévues.

[Tomcat]

Ce n'est pas aux EAU (Abu Dhabi ?) a côté que l'on prépare le plus gros feu d'artifice au Monde pour le 1er janvier ? Entendu cela vite fait a la radio.

 

Oui, 400.000 projectiles tirés en 6 minutes depuis les iles artificielles de Dubai.  

[Fenrir]

L'Arabie Saoudite ne fait que du tourisme religieux alors que les EAU/Qatar veulent attirer tout le monde chez eux. Deux approches différentes.

[Ciders]

Ce n'est pas pour rien que les Saoudiens filent faire la fête à Bahreïn, à Dubaï ou au Liban dès qu'ils en ont l'occasion. Chez eux, ce n'est pas possible. Bien sur, tout le monde le sait, mais c'est hors des frontières du royaume, ce qui sauve les apparences.

[glitter]

Bonjour à tous.

 

Je n'ai pas vu ce sujet abordé sur d'autres fils, donc j'en parle ici.

 

http://www.lalibre.be/actu/international/l-arabie-saoudite-offre-3-milliards-de-dollars-a-l-armee-libanaise-qui-s-equipera-chez-les-francais-52c053993570105ef7df78e6

L'Arabie saoudite offre 3 milliards de dollars à l'armée libanaise... qui s'équipera chez les Français

 

Bon, il semble que les Saoudiens vont vraiment faire un premier pas, très net, en direction de la France.

 

D'autres articles, par des sources Libanaises, parlent même de coopération stratégique pour la décennie à venir et pour une valeur largement à 100 milliards. On n'y est pas encore, mais bon, si économiquement parlant ça sonne comme une excellente nouvelle pour les salariés Francais, politiquement, ca ma parait un changement qui pourrait être assez énorme.

 

J'ai du mal à imaginer voir simplement se mettre en place deux camps AS/France et Iran/USA, surtout que le rapprochement Iran-USA n'est pas forcément bien vu outre-atlantique et que les gains ne me paraissent pas énorme en face de la perte d'un client comme l'Arabie Saoudite, voir même d'autres (Qatar).

 

Quels raisonnements ais manqués ?

[gerole]

on en parle sur le fil liban

[Tonton Flingueur]

Bonjour à tous.

 

Je n'ai pas vu ce sujet abordé sur d'autres fils, donc j'en parle ici.

 

Et pourtant c'est abordé dans minimum 2 fils et il y a déjà pas mal de pages sur le sujet ;)

[alpacks]

Et pourtant c'est abordé dans minimum 2 fils et il y a déjà pas mal de pages sur le sujet ;)

 

  Lui dire ou on en parle aurait été encore mieux ^^

 

 Bien que je ne connaisse qu'un fil a ce propos (le second aucune idée) dans le sous forum économie & défense, sujet liban ... Enfin je crois

 

   Perso je pense que les Saoudiens vont probablement exiger de nous un débarquement de BPC au Liban au préalable, au vu du risque évident d'accélération soudaine de combats autour du conflit syrien qui se déroulerait au Liban ... Vu qu'il me semble qu'on a retiré les Leclercs de la FINUL au sud Liban ect ...

 

   Et que le besoin va être immédiat, c'est pas des contrats a hauteur de 3 milliards qui vont sauver la mise de l'état libanais quand a la menace immédiate qui lui pend au nez ... De la y a pas 36 solutions qui s'offrent a nous : Les conditions des Saoudiens vont probablement être le déclenchement d'une Opex préventive française au Liban de protection/interposition et d'interdiction aux moyens syriens de faire quoi que se soit dans le territoire libanais (bombardement, incursions, pilonnage d'artillerie ect)

 

  Je vois gros comme une maison un BPC avec quelques leclercs & caesar et 4-5 rafales, 1000 soldats et des VAB-VBCI avec projet de laisser les VAB sur place (genre on vient avec on s'en sert mais a coup sur l'état libanais en héritera ...) et pourquoi pas a la limite une batterie Mamba (protection de Beyrouth) ou une frégate horizon (sachant que sa zone d'interception ira jusqu'en Syrie ...) et ça ira pas trop mal pour la mission si ça se limite a quelques éventuels accrochages ...

 

   Avec en + possibilité de pouvoir dissuader les troupes du hezbollah parties en Syrie d'espérer revenir un jour en plaçant les Leclercs pile la ou ils auraient pu espérer passer au niveau régional ...

 

   Les Saoudiens ne vont pas nous faire un contrat de 3 milliards de matos a l'oeil rien que pour nos beaux yeux, il y a forcément anguille sous roche d'une négociation d'Opex en conditions ... Avec possibilité que l'état saoudien paye aussi l'Opex en frais directs (car si ils nous exigent une Opex Hollande les a probablement averti qu'au niveau budgétaire on est coincé avec le cout du Mali + RCA, mais bon 150 millions d'euros sur 3 milliards c'est une goutte d'eau : Ils payeront ...)

[glitter]

Et pourtant c'est abordé dans minimum 2 fils et il y a déjà pas mal de pages sur le sujet ;)

J'ai bien trouve le fil du Liban, mais la bas, on se focalise uniquement sur ce que l'on pourrait leur vendre.

Certes, tres interessant car on voit que la question n'est absolument pas simple, mais cela ne couvre pas la question que j'ai aborde ici.

[glitter]

   Les Saoudiens ne vont pas nous faire un contrat de 3 milliards de matos a l'oeil rien que pour nos beaux yeux, il y a forcément anguille sous roche d'une négociation d'Opex en conditions ... Avec possibilité que l'état saoudien paye aussi l'Opex en frais directs (car si ils nous exigent une Opex Hollande les a probablement averti qu'au niveau budgétaire on est coincé avec le cout du Mali + RCA, mais bon 150 millions d'euros sur 3 milliards c'est une goutte d'eau : Ils payeront ...)

Ah, oui, effectivement, j'avais bien imagine une OPEX mais pas aussi large en fait.

 

En lisant des journaux libanais, ils n'ont pas l'air super heureux de voir leur classe politique mendier comme cela avec l'Arabie Saoudite, on est certain qu'une telle intervention ne provoquerait pas une grande reprobation dans la societes Libanaise ? ah, zut, pour le coup, on sort du sujet.

Bon, je vais aller voir sur le topic Liban alors.

 

Donc la reponse a ma question (enfin, ton avis), c'est bien que l'AS, meme si elle fait un pas vers la France reste loin de se brouiller serieusement avec les USA.

[Tonton Flingueur]

Donc la reponse a ma question (enfin, ton avis), c'est bien que l'AS, meme si elle fait un pas vers la France reste loin de se brouiller serieusement avec les USA.

En même temps ils seraient sacrément con s'ils venaient a faire ca,  parapluie dans un cas, et petite ombrelle a cocktail de l'autre.

[Gibbs le Cajun]

 

   Avec en + possibilité de pouvoir dissuader les troupes du hezbollah parties en Syrie d'espérer revenir un jour en plaçant les Leclercs pile la ou ils auraient pu espérer passer au niveau régional ...

 

  

 

je pense que les troupes du Hezbollah envoyé en Syrie rentreront sans problème au Liban ,vu qu'ils ont perçus tout sur place au niveau armement et matos .

 

le retour se fera sûrement bien avant que l'armée Libanaise perçoivent tout le matos que tu cite .

 

et puis une fois le matos et armement "réintégré" à l'armée Syrienne ,ils repasseront en "civil" et "fêteront" leur retour directement dans leur zone de "casernement" au Liban .

 

donc les Leclerc "Libanais' pil poil ou ils passeront au retour j'ai un peu de mal à y croire .

[Tonton Flingueur]

Oui enfin bon faut arrêter le délire 2 secondes, le Liban aurait plus de 100 Leclerc que ca changerait rien au retour au pays, LAF c'est pas l'IDF et de très très loin et une opex aussi burnée soit elle ca ne sera jms la force de frappe de l'IDF la aussi.

 

Et comme dit Gibbs, le retour se fera discrètement dans tout les cas (et pas a cause de la "peur" de l'armée libanaise ni de l'armée française si il y avait une OPEX).

Modifié le 7 janvier 2014 par Tonton Flingueur

[Tonton Flingueur]

J'ai bien trouve le fil du Liban, mais la bas, on se focalise uniquement sur ce que l'on pourrait leur vendre.

Certes, tres interessant car on voit que la question n'est absolument pas simple, mais cela ne couvre pas la question que j'ai aborde ici.

Autant pr moi ;) 

[glitter]

En même temps ils seraient sacrément con s'ils venaient a faire ca,  parapluie dans un cas, et petite ombrelle a cocktail de l'autre.

 

Pourquoi "sacrement con" ? Cette alliance prendra bien fin un jour ou l'autre apres tout ;)

 

Bon, mais la reponse a la question, elle semble plus se joueur avec l'apparent rapprochement des americains avec l'Iran.

[Henri K.]

 

 

Exclusive: CIA Helped Saudis in Secret Chinese Missile Deal

 

Saudi Arabia has long been a backroom player in the Middle East's nuclear game of thrones, apparently content to bankroll the ambitions of Pakistan and Iraq (under Saddam Hussein) to counter the rise of its mortal enemy, Iran.

But as the West and Iran have moved closer to a nuclear accommodation, signs are emerging that the monarchy is ready to give the world a peek at a new missile strike force of its own - which has been upgraded with Washington's careful connivance.

According to a well-placed intelligence source, Saudi Arabia bought ballistic missiles from China in 2007 in a hitherto unreported deal that won Washington's quiet approval on the condition that CIA technical experts could verify they were not designed to carry nuclear warheads.

The solid-fueled, medium-range DF-21 East Wind missiles are an improvement over the DF-3s the Saudis clandestinely acquired from China in 1988, experts say, although they differ on how much of an upgrade they were.

The newer missiles, known as CSS-5s in NATO parlance, have a shorter range but greater accuracy, making them more useful against "high-value targets in Tehran, like presidential palaces or supreme-leader palaces," Jeffrey Lewis, director of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, tells Newsweek. They can also be fired much more quickly.

The poor accuracy of the old DF-3s rendered them impotent during the first Gulf War as a counterstrike to Saddam Hussein's Scuds, according to Desert Warrior, a 1996 memoir by Saudi Prince Khaled bin Sultan, then-commander of the Riyadh's Air Defense Forces. King Fahd declined to fling them at Iraq because the likely result would have been mass civilian casualties, and "the coalition's air campaign being waged against Iraq was sufficient retaliation," Khaled wrote.

When that war ended, the Saudis went looking for something better. In China, they likely found it. But unlike in 1988, when they royally annoyed Washington with their secret acquisition of DF-3s, this time they decided to play nice. And the CIA was their assigned playmate.

CIA and Saudi air force officers hammered out the ways and means for acquiring the new Chinese missiles during a series of secretive meetings at the spy agency's Langley, Va., headquarters and over dinners at restaurants in northern Virginia during the spring and summer of 2007, a well-informed source tells Newsweek. The arrangements were so sensitive that then-deputy CIA director Stephen Kappes ordered the CIA's logistical costs, estimated at $600,000 to $700,000 buried under a vague "ops support" heading in internal budget documents - prompting loud complaints from the head of the agency's support staff.

Aside from technical personnel, among the few CIA officials let in on the deal were the agency's then-number three, Associate Deputy Director Michael Morrell, a longtime Asia hand; John Kringen, then-head of the agency's intelligence directorate; and the CIA's Riyadh station chief, who Newsweek is not identifying because he remains undercover. Two analysts subsequently traveled to Saudi Arabia, inspected the crates and returned satisfied that the missiles were not designed to carry nukes, says the source, who asked for anonymity in exchange for discussing the still-secret deal.

The CIA declined to comment, as did current and former White House officials. The Chinese and Saudi embassies in Washington did not respond to requests for comment.

Reports that the Saudis have upgraded their missile fleet, however, are not new. Former CIA analyst Jonathan Scherck, for example, who managed intelligence reports on Saudi Arabia as a contractor from 2005 to 2007, claimed in Patriot Lost, an unauthorized 2010 book, that China began supplying a "turnkey nuclear ballistic missile system" to the kingdom with the covert approval of the George W. Bush administration, "no later than December 2003."

Lewis discounts Scherck's "nuclear" claim, which Scherck says he based on reports he saw from CIA spies and technical collection systems.

Kenneth Pollack, a former CIA and White House National Security Council expert on the Middle East, also dismisses Scherck's nuclear scenario, as well as recent claims by the BBC and Time magazine - citing a former head of Israeli military intelligence - that the Saudis had placed Pakistani nuclear warheads "on order."

"Nonsense and disinformation," he told Newsweek.

But Lewis says that other small but important details in Patriot Lost checked out. "One can raise a number of questions about the logic in Scherck's book - particularly when he starts imagining Pakistani warheads on those Chinese missiles or accusing Bush administration officials of various crimes," Lewis explains, "but when Scherck sticks to the details about monitoring foreign missile shipments and deployments, he's believable."

An engineer on a U.S. Navy guided missile cruiser before joining the CIA, Scherck was fired in 2008 for pursuing details out of channels at the National Geospatial Agency, the satellite imagery service helmed by James Clapper when he began to dig into the missile mystery. Clapper is now director of National Intelligence. Then the Justice Department pounced on Scherck, seizing the modest revenues from his self-published book and prohibiting him from writing or talking further about the matter. Now 39, Scherck works as a night manager of a hotel in Southern California while he works on a screenplay.

Meanwhile, the Saudis have been acting like they want people to take notice of their previously furtive missile program.

"Over the past few years, Saudi Arabia has started talking a lot about its Strategic Missile Force," Lewis writes in the draft of an upcoming piece forForeign Policy that he showed Newsweek. "And, in the course of doing so, Riyadh seems to be hinting that it has bought at least two new types of ballistic missiles."

"For example," Lewis writes, "in 2010, Khaled - by then deputy defense minister - cut the ribbon on a new headquarters building in Riyadh for the Strategic Missile Force. They released a number of images of the building, both inside and out. Moreover, since about 2007, the Saudi press has covered graduation ceremonies from the Strategic Missile Force school in Wadi ad-Dawasir - especially if the commencement speaker is a person of importance.

"The process of recruiting Saudis has also resulted in fair amount of information appearing in print, right down to the pay schedule," he added. "For a while, the Strategic Missile Force even had a website, although it is no longer active."

The most intriguing photo to appear so far, showed "Khaled's replacement - the recently removed deputy minister of defense Prince Fahd - visiting the Strategic Missile Force headquarters in Riyadh," Lewis writes. Instead of gifting him with the usual "solid-gold falcon in a glass case... the stuff dreams are made of," Lewis cracks, officials are shown posing with a glass-enclosed case of three missile models.

"The missile on the far left is, obviously, a DF-3 of the sort that Saudi Arabia purchased from China in the late 1980s," Lewis writes. "But the other two? They could any one of Chinese or Pakistani missiles. All the missiles Lewis mentions are nuclear-capable.

Again, the unprecedented missiles-and-pony show could be a deception. In any case, the Saudis are banging the drums around their missile bases - without any apparent notice here, Lewis says, probably because it's all in Arabic.

The local Saudi press has been covering blood drives and disaster relief efforts by personnel at known missile bases, Lewis tells Newsweek. And while officials have been secretive about another missile base, he's discovered that "people on Arabic bulletin boards have big mouths.

"Turns out, if you're a Saudi assigned to a launch unit," he says, "the most natural thing in the world is to announce on a bulletin board, 'Hi, I work for the Saudi missile force, and I've been assigned to this place, and where can I get an apartment?' And people openly talk about their deployments in a way that Saudi officials would freak if they realized it."

Maybe. But you can't scare people if nobody knows what you got. Maybe the Saudis are suddenly trying to get attention. They've faced the deterrence dilemma before.

In late 1988, Khaled recalled in his memoir, he worried that nobody had detected the deployment of the secretly acquired Chinese DF-3s. What good was having them if nobody was afraid of them? He suggested leaking their existence, "as the object of acquiring the weapon would not have been achieved" unless the world (read: Iranians and Israelis) knew about it. "As it happened," he wrote in Desert Warrior, "we had no need to do so, because the Americans broke the news first." And they were in a king's rage about it.

But what about the 2007 Chinese missile deal Newsweek was told about? No one seems to have noticed that, either.

But they may now.

Important note: Those DF-21s - or whatever they are - don't dramatically tilt the Middle East map in the Saudis' favor.

"Even if it is the case that Saudi Arabia received DF-21 missiles, unless they also received nuclear warheads for the missiles, it has little meaning for the regional military balance," Pollack told Newsweek.

"Saudi Arabia has had Chinese ballistic missiles since the 1980s, and the DF-21 has a shorter range than the CSS-2s they originally bought. A conventional warhead on the DF-21 would be too small to cause the kind of damage that would have a strategic impact. Even if the Chinese had sold Saudis the mod-4 warhead for the DF-21 - which theoretically can cripple an aircraft carrier - the Saudis lack the sensor technology to find an aircraft carrier, except when one is docked at Port Jebel Ali in the UAE, Saudi Arabia's close ally."

Lewis agrees - with caveats. When you're talking nukes and missiles, you always have to factor in the weird stuff, like Kissinger whispering to Hanoi that Nixon was bonkers over Vietnam and would slap the armageddon button if pushed too far - the so-called "madman theory."

"It has its advantages, it definitely has its advantages," Lewis says of the new Saudi missiles deal, if only because some of those missiles could have been modified to carry nuclear warheads after CIA technicians left. "But I don't know if I were an Iranian I would feel fundamentally different about the DF 21s than I did about the DF-3.... "

He adds, "Maybe there's a whole gut, or visceral, thing, where they" - the Iranians - "say, 'Hey, these guys spent a lot of money, they're serious.' So maybe it just conveys the Saudis' will in a way that is unsettling, in a way that the fine old missile system wasn't.

"It's a weird thing. It has its own, strange logic. So yeah, it makes a difference. But it's not a difference-maker."

Newsweek Contributing Editor Jeff Stein writes the SpyTalk column from Washington.

 

http://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-cia-helped-saudis-chinese-missile-deal-227283

 

Henri K.

[Gravity]

Je suis plus que dubitatif face à cette ‘information’. Imaginez un seul instant les chinois autorisant l’accès de la CIA à leur technologie de missile stratégique, c’est juste risible.

 

Mais on se rassure comme on peut par méthode Coué…

 

 

 

Threat to Mideast Military Balance : U.S. Caught Napping by Sino-Saudi Missile Deal

 

May 04, 1988|JIM MANN | Times Staff Writer

 

WASHINGTON — One day in early March, a U.S. official working in a special government office that keeps track of the construction of airstrips around the world looked at a reconnaissance photo of the Saudi Arabian desert and noticed something extraordinary about a newly constructed airfield.

 

"Doesn't that look like what the Chinese do with their missile sites?" he asked. Puzzled, he took the picture to some American experts on the Chinese military, who agreed with him.

 

Within 48 hours, Mideast specialists working in U.S. reconnaissance programs checked and confirmed the first official's alarming suspicions: Saudi Arabia was in the process of installing Chinese CSS-2 intermediate-range missiles.

 

The discovery of the missile site has reverberated throughout the U.S. government, forcing a painful reexamination of U.S. intelligence-gathering capabilities and raising questions about both the military balance in the Persian Gulf and Chinese intentions around the world.

 

Nearly two years had elapsed between the Saudi agreement to purchase the Chinese weapons and the discovery of the deal by U.S. intelligence officials poring over photos of the Arabian desert.

 

U.S. officials now acknowledge that they missed early clues to the weapons sale and were not watching closely enough what the Saudis were doing. They had not been paying much attention to the deserts of Saudi Arabia since the United States sent its warships into the Persian Gulf last summer to escort U.S.-registered oil tankers.

 

The new missiles now threaten to alter the military balance in the Middle East. The Chinese missiles have a range of nearly 2,000 miles and were originally designed to carry nuclear warheads.

 

Chinese, Saudi Pledges

 

Both Chinese and Saudi officials have told the United States that the missiles will carry conventional, not nuclear, warheads. Saudi Arabia recently underlined that assurance by announcing that it would sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and thus pledge not to develop nuclear weapons.

 

'Crossing a Firebreak'

 

"No other country in the world has ever sought to transfer a weapon like that," said one official. "The Chinese were really crossing a firebreak by selling that kind of weapon to the Saudis."

 

What follows is the story of China's unprecedented sale of intermediate-range missiles and of the belated U.S. discovery of it. It is based on interviews with U.S. officials, some of whom spoke only on condition that neither their names nor their agencies would be identified.

 

The sale dates to July, 1985, when Prince Bandar ibn Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, made a surprise visit to China.

 

That trip attracted some attention because the Saudi regime is one of the 22 remaining governments that recognize Taiwan's Nationalist regime as the legitimate government of China. There was speculation in Beijing that China and Saudi Arabia were exploring the possibility of establishing diplomatic relations.

 

But this speculation was off the mark. The prince wanted to talk about arms, not diplomacy.

 

At the time, Congress had just rejected the Saudis' request for new U.S. arms, including F-15 planes and short-range Lance missiles. U.S. analysts now believe that while in Beijing, the prince reached an agreement in principle from Chinese leaders to purchase China's intermediate-range CSS-2 missiles.

 

'Really Big Bucks' Involved

 

"Bucks were a factor, really big bucks, multibillion dollars in one sale," said one U.S. analyst who asked not to be identified. "In addition, this was part of a pattern of Chinese foreign policy, of wanting to play a major role throughout the world."

 

U.S. officials say China has shown a particular desire for influence in the Middle East, where it has sought to cultivate relationships with virtually every country in the region. China has had recent arms deals with Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria and Israel, they say.

 

Yet the accuracy of the new missiles is so poor that they are considered of limited use with only conventional explosives. A State Department official wondered: "How can we be sure these missiles will only have conventional warheads?"

 

Another State Department official pointed out that Saudi Arabia has denied the United States permission to see the missile site and the missiles. "We would like to have had access to them," he said.

 

Apart from the missiles' impact on the Middle East, they have created new jitters within the U.S. government over China's arms sales.

 

Even China's sales of Silkworm anti-ship missiles to Iran was not so serious, U.S. officials said. U.S. objections to the Silkworms were based not on the nature of the weapons system but on their threat to U.S. ships in the Persian Gulf. By contrast, U.S. officials say, they objected to China's selling intermediate-range missiles to any country, whether U.S. interests were threatened or not.

 

Yet never before had the Chinese sold intermediate-range missiles. U.S. officials say they are not sure whether Prince Bandar went to China seeking the CSS-2 missiles or whether Chinese officials took the initiative.

 

"A decision like that had to be made at the highest levels (in China)," said one U.S. expert. "Maybe no more than eight or 10 people in China knew what was happening." U.S. officials believe that only Chinese military officials, and China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, knew about the discussions.

 

U.S. government analysts believe China and Saudi Arabia ironed out the details and struck a final deal on the sale of the missiles in 1986. Soon afterward, some Saudi personnel began traveling to China for secret training on the missiles.

 

Work Begun Last Year

 

Construction of the missile site is thought to have started some time last year about 60 miles south of Riyadh. One U.S. source suggested the Saudis may have used a private construction crew from a third country, but other government experts said Chinese workers were imported.

 

China is thought to have produced no more than 100 of the CSS-2 missiles in their original version, which was first made operational in 1971. U.S. officials say they believe Saudi Arabia purchased between 20 and 24 of these missiles.

 

What U.S. officials finally uncovered in early March was "a training center," said one U.S. government expert. The Saudis were preparing to train crews to man the missile sites.

 

The Saudi missile site presented U.S. policy-makers with an awkward problem. Chinese Foreign Minister Wu Xueqian was about to arrive in Washington in March for a long-awaited official visit, which the United States hoped would ease a series of recent strains in Sino-American relations.

 

"It was a bad time for the China hands," said one U.S. official. "Wu was coming to town the next day. All the policy people were saying, 'Don't give us another problem.' "

 

State Department Disclaimer

 

A State Department official involved in the policy discussions insisted this was not true. "There wasn't any disinclination to address this issue," he said.

 

U.S. officials led by Secretary of State George P. Shultz raised the subject of the missile sale during the talks with Wu. Asked whether the United States was satisfied with China's response, a State Department official replied: "No, but we're satisfied that if we want to pursue this, we have the means for doing it."

 

In early April, Wu publicly confirmed the sale of the missiles to Saudi Arabia. But he said the Saudis had promised China the missiles would not be transferred to other countries and would be used only for defensive purposes. The sale of the missiles "will help stabilize the situation in that country and in the Middle East in general," Wu asserted.

 

The discovery of the missiles by U.S. officials produced a quick examination of how U.S. intelligence agencies had failed to detect the missile sale. U.S. agencies prepared a Special National Intelligence Estimate, an internal intelligence report, reviewing the transaction, but the report is classified and could not be obtained.

 

One official familiar with this review said the United States had failed to uncover the sale at the time the deal was made. He said there were some "early indications" that China was shipping arms to Saudi Arabia, but U.S. analysts mistakenly believed that Saudi Arabia was merely being used as a transshipment point for Chinese weapons sales elsewhere in the Mideast.

 

'Looking at the Desert'

 

The other problem, this official said, was that U.S. intelligence analysts were not paying enough attention to Saudi Arabia, a nation with which the United States has long enjoyed close relations. "Analysts were focused on the gulf and Iran," he said. "They were not focused on the desert. . . . Now it's a high priority, and our people are looking at the desert."

 

U.S. officials in the executive branch described the discovery of the missile site in March as stemming from aerial or satellite reconnaissance. A source on Capitol Hill said that while this might be true, he believed U.S. intelligence officials might have first received a tip from a human source.

 

Throughout the summer and fall of 1987, the United States and China were at odds over China's sales of Silkworm anti-ship missiles to Iran. The regime of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had installed the Silkworms near the entrance to the Persian Gulf, and U.S. officials had became concerned that the Chinese missiles could be used against U.S. ships.

 

U.S. officials say the sale of intermediate-range missiles was different from the Silkworm sale--in some ways less serious, in other ways more so.

 

"The Saudi missile problem falls into a different realm," said one State Department expert. "No U.S. territory was threatened. It was sold to a friendly country. It raised concerns about Israel's security, but in all probability, the reason the Saudis bought them had nothing to do with Israel."

 

Protection Against Iran

 

The Saudi regime wanted the missiles as protection against Iran, this official said. Last month, Saudi King Fahd warned in a newspaper interview that his country would not hesitate to use the Chinese missiles in defense against Iran.

 

But apart from being unprecedented, the sale of intermediate-range missiles introduced a new weapons system into the Mideast, perhaps the most volatile region in the world, raising the question of whether other nations in the region would seek to acquire similar missiles.

 

Los Angeles Times

 

 

Royal Saudi Strategic Missile Force

 

 

http://www.air-defense.net/forum/topic/8178-arm%C3%A9e-de-lair-saoudienne/page-8#entry729007

 

Auquel cas, j’imagine d’ores et déjà parfaitement des missiles Shaheen-II en pièces détachées faisant le voyage Islamabad-Ryad.

 

"Report Alleges Saudi Arabia Working on 'Secret Nuclear Program' with Pakistani Assistance," WMD Insights, May 2006, wmdinsights.org (James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies)

 

Pakistan makes surprise offer of nuclear fuel service.

 

Saudi Arabia, China Sign Nuclear Cooperation Pact

 

How safe are Pakistan`s nuclear assets

 

India Thwarts Israeli Destruction of Pakistan's "Islamic Bomb" (Institute for National Strategic Studies)

Modifié le 2 février 2014 par Gravity

[Henri K.]

Je suis plus que dubitatif face à cette ‘information’. Imaginez un seul instant les chinois autorisant l’accès de la CIA à leur technologie de missile stratégique, c’est juste risible.

 

Mais on se rassure comme on peut par méthode Coué…

 

 

 

 

Royal Saudi Strategic Missile Force

 

 

http://www.air-defense.net/forum/topic/8178-arm%C3%A9e-de-lair-saoudienne/page-8#entry729007

 

Auquel cas, j’imagine d’ores et déjà parfaitement des missiles Shaheen-II en pièces détachées faisant le voyage Islamabad-Ryad.

 

"Report Alleges Saudi Arabia Working on 'Secret Nuclear Program' with Pakistani Assistance," WMD Insights, May 2006, wmdinsights.org (James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies)

 

How safe are Pakistan`s nuclear assets

 

India Thwarts Israeli Destruction of Pakistan's "Islamic Bomb" (Institute for National Strategic Studies)

 

Pour les Chinois, DF-21 / DF-21A c'est un peu du "has been" et cela fait plus de 23 ans que la version de base est au service au 2nd corps d'artillerie, et 14 ans pour la version -A.

 

Pour le moment les nouveaux MRBMs chinois c'est DF-25 / 26 / 27.

 

Henri K.

[Gravity]

Je ne crois pas que KSA va se contenter uniquement du « DF-21 / DF-21A has been » - cela n’a strictement aucun sens - et ira tout doucement mais surement plus loin avec un ailleurs…

 

 

 

 

 

...

Modifié le 2 février 2014 par Gravity

[Henri K.]

Je ne crois pas que KSA va se contenter uniquement du « DF-21 / DF-21A has been » - cela n’a strictement aucun sens - et y ira tout doucement mais surement plus loin avec un ailleurs…

 

Les Saoudiens ne sauront pas exploiter les versions au-delà de -A.

 

Henri K.